Captive, Chapter 4: Peace

[dream_it_all]

Title: Captive
Author: Dreaming of Everything dreams_of_all
Series: Yu Yu Hakusho
Characters/Pairings: Hiei/Botan
Rating/Warnings: PG/K+, pretty tame. Warnings for het and unrealistic romance.
Summary: AU HieiBotan fic. Hiei, a mass murderer who now regrets his acts, is being held captive in a stone tower by King Enma for political reasons. Botan, a witch in training, crashes through his window to escape from a mob that wants to burn her.


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Heaven gives it's glimpses only to those
Not in position to look too close.
--A Passing Glimpse, Robert Frost

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Botan woke up slowly, drifting out of sleep softly, gently. She pulled herself upright, yawning deeply, before looking around the room. She didn't see Hiei at first, until she turned around, to find him watching her, face impassive, early-morning light (the sun had just barely risen) glinting off of his emotionless eyes.

She offered him a sleepy smile and a cheery, if tired, good-morning by way of greeting. Slightly nervous, she realized she was subconsciously waiting for his reaction, to see how he had reinterpreted the strange relationship between them.

How would he react to her, now that she knew his secret?

How was she going to react, for that matter? She supposed it was too late now.

Hiei was reevaluating, again, his thoughts on the confusing girl that had fallen into his life. She had greeted him, and happily, with no nervousness at all, after clinging to him, or at least his foot, half the night. This wasn't the wary reserve he expected. Deserved.

He found himself in a near-constant state of confusion around the woman, but somehow he couldn't resent her intrusion into his life. No matter how badly it ended, at least she had seemed to enjoy his company. For those few days.

More than he deserved.

And Botan herself. Chased down by the people who had raised her, all of them with murder on their minds, then finding herself caught up in the life of unresponsive demon, then finding out that he was the most-feared individual in the entire country. It hurt to think of the pain that would cause her. He could do nothing more than allow her to leave, to find a new life. One she deserved. Leaving him to his verdict, another eternity alone and feared, until Enma found a way to kill him.

The way it should be. No matter how painful for him, as long as Botan found the happiness she deserved.

oOo

Botan was slightly off-put by the silence; while Hiei was quiet at best and stone-cold-silent at worst, he at least always acknowledged her greetings. Had she offended him somehow? She remembered the night before, how she had sought confirmation that he was the Forbidden Child, and the hurt in his response. Was he still angry? Was it something else?

...And she remembered the faces of the villagers she had known for her whole life as they chased after her, seeking to kill her. To burn her alive, because she was a witch. Hated, feared and ostracized, but tolerated, because they needed her. Had needed her. Enma's Priests had provided an alternate supply, and the removal of her demand had made her instantly expendable.

All those years, all counting for nothing. It was a hard thought to bear.

And she could understand Hiei, somewhat, if she thought about it like that. He was considered even more of a curse than she was, so that there was nobody for him.

So... Lonely, she thought again. More so than she was, than she would ever be.

She was just another person who had panicked when faced with his past, even though she knew him and he had never offered her any harm.

That thought hurt her, maybe as much as the betrayal of her village. A stabbing pain compared to a dull ache.

She looked up again to meet his eyes as the clouds of thought cleared from them. Melancholic lilac met inscrutable red.

"I'm sorry," said Botan quietly.

"There's nothing to be sorry for," said Hiei in response, shifting his gaze so he wouldn't have to look at her.

There was a moment of heavy silence.

I guess he is angry, for whatever reason, thought Botan sadly, noticing how he had broken the eye contact.

"...I... I apologize as well." Botan looked up from her hands, which she was carefully studying, startled.

"Why?" Her response was nearly whispered.

"For..." A lifetime. Being there, and plunging you into this. For hurting you... "...everything."

"No!" came her response, louder than she meant it to be, startling him into looking at her again. Her voice was passionate, insistent. "Don't apologize for that. I am glad I met you! You were never anything other than decent to me, and it was my own silly fault I panicked instead of thinking things through like a rational individual. I liked your company! I was... happy..." She trailed off, biting her lip, fighting off tears.

When she looked up again, her sight slightly blurred, she found Hiei looking at her with an almost painfully open face, confusion and hope and fear tangled together in his expression. He made as if to say something, stopped, swallowed hard. His eyes remained fixed on her.

She lowered her head again, wrapping her arms around her legs, curling up around herself.

A cautious touch barely brushed her hand as she began to sob, silently, for so many painful reasons. It wasn't fair that Hiei believed so firmly that he deserved his sentence! That he was who he was, because he wasn't, anymore. That he would never really live again, outside of the cold stone and burning wards of his prison.

Hiei couldn't help but reach out to her, offering what little comfort he could.

She looked up for a moment, asking for permission, before grasping the offered hand and clinging to it as a final lifeline while she cried herself out.

A while later her sobs had quieted, and she recognized the slight depression of the matress next to her as her companion sitting beside her.

"...Thank you..." she sighed, drying her eyes. She didn't relinquish her hold on his hand, purposely ignoring it.

"Why?" asked the demon beside her.

"Why not? You were there for me, you cared, you offered help. And..." She broke off, unsure if she should continue. "I think I might understand how you feel." Her words began to come faster, more hurried and insistent, more embarrassed. "The hurt, and the loneliness, because I think it's what I'm feeling, and... I can't see the Forbidden Child in you. You regret what you've done.

"And then there was Yusuke and Kurama, and how they were so worried about you. There was the way you would help me, would always catch me, would be there for me, even though I barely knew you. I felt comfortable around you, at ease, even though I had just met you, and even when my conscious mind was still processing the shock. And... It hurt, when I realized that I had hurt you when I flinched away from you when I... found out."

Botan blushed heavily, looking still more determinedly at her knees. She made no move to remove her hand from Hiei's.

Hiei hesitated, and felt an impossible hope grow in his mind. Somehow, this time, he couldn't quite find the spirit to crush it. Not this time: maybe because it had happened too many times before, both before and after he had met Botan, and maybe because this time meant more.

He was both pointedly ignoring and excruciatingly aware of his continued contact with Botan, and the way she had made no move to remove her hand from his.

The hypnotic silence began to draw the words from him, in a long-needed flood of release.

"I... Deserve my fate. I killed... more people than I can remember. More than anyone knows. I have no doubt you've seen the graves and heard the stories. There is no excuse; there is also no excuse to allow me to go free again. I cannot... fix what I've broken, but I can at least accept my punishment. Suffer, to relive their suffering, as much as I can.

"And I am... lonely. And that is part of it, and I know that nobody will ever lo--want to spend time around me, and I know that I will never escape, and that keeps me from finding out if I could enforce my punishments on myself.

"Somehow, though, I couldn't help but enjoy your company. Couldn't quite make myself remove you from my life. Partly because you were hurt, and needed my help, partly because there was nothing I could do about the situation, and partly because you were so kind. You treated me like a person. Like someone worthy of respect.

"But then you found out my true self. It... hurt so badly to see you afraid of me. To see you verify, again, everything I knew. Because some part of me still hoped you would forgive me, even though I couldn't forgive myself.

"But then you acted like you always had, and that hurt too, because it was what I wanted, but it only fed the hope that I couldn't live with. If I hoped, then I would be disappointed, and I can only take... so much pain. And you would leave, and you should: you should live a good life, but some selfish part of me wanted you to stay. That hurt as well...

"I can't understand why you would want to spend time around me, and I can't help but start hoping again, even though that hurts too, but somehow... I think I'm happy that this happened. No matter how much it ends up hurting."

Hiei looked away in turn, his own eyes inexplicably welling with tears, and he noticed with some alarm that Botan was crying again.

"No one deserves that. No matter what they did. No matter what you did. I think you deserve something better." There was a quiet conviction to her words that brooked no argument. "Even if no one else does--and I think Kurama and Yusuke do--I care what happens to you. I want to see you happy. I wouldn't be who I am if I left you to live my own life, and I couldn't live it happily if I did. I don't think I couldn’t live with myself. I am... your friend, now, I think," Botan glanced at Hiei for confirmation, "and would like to spend more time with you. I enjoy your company as well, but it shouldn't...hurt. I'm not going to just leave you--at the least I'll come and visit--and you should hope more. You should... do your best to live again. I would be sad, being happy while you suffered." She had a bittersweet smile on her face.

Confusion filled Botan's thoughts, filling them with confusion. Does Hiei love me? Yusuke said he thought he might.

Maybe... Maybe he does. At least he... he likes me.

And... I like him. It hurts me to think of him hurting, even more when it's because of me. I want to spend time around him, be around him. I'm... comfortable around him. Even though I know what he's done. Even though I hardly know him, I feel like I understand him. Like I do know him. Funny how I'm just realizing this, how I said it, and meant it, without really knowing it. I... I...

What do I think of Hiei?

...How quickly can someone fall in love?

Botan refocused on reality to find Hiei looking at her, and his eyes caught on hers. She grasped the hand holding hers a little tighter, needing the contact.

"Would... Would it be okay if I hugged you?" Botan felt the words leave her mouth and immediately wished she could draw them back. It was almost as if the filters for what she wanted to say and what common sense dictated she say had broken down today. She gave a quick glance to Hiei and saw him nod once, startled, before quickly looking away, then edging close enough that she could wrap him in her arms. She felt him stiffen for a moment before relaxing and, awkwardly, return the embrace.

Again Botan felt a relaxed peace in his arms, surrounded by his inhuman warmth, the rise and fall of his breathing, the counter-beat of his heart and the smell scent of him, all winter air, ashes, pine and a warm, human smell uniquely his. She pressed her face into his chest, feeling the prickle of drying tears on her face, feeling safe. It gave her a strange courage, and she found a way to voice the words she needed to say.

"I... I think I love you..."

Hiei wrapped his arms tighter around her, a wordless communication.

"...I might too."

She could feel his voice surrounding her, somewhere between auditory and tactile.

They stayed that way for a while, each awkwardly holding the other, needing some little comfort, anything.

Maybe it wasn't so little, in the end.

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Love has earth to which she clings
With hills and circling arms about--
Wall within wall to shut fear out.
But Thought has need for no such things,
For Thought has a pair of dauntless wings.

On snow and sand and turf, I see
Where Love has left a printed trace
With straining in the world's embrace.
And such is love and glad to be.
But Thought has shaken his ankles free.

Thought cleaves the interstellar gloom
And sits in Siruis' disc all night,
Till day makes him retrace his flight,
With smell of burning on every plume,
Back past the sun to an earthly room.

His gains in heaven are what they are,
Yet some say Love by being thrall
And simply staying possesses all
In several beauty that Thought fares far
To find fused in another star.

--Bond and Free by Robert Frost

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